USVI-On-Line

Up early to go to out to breakfast with the girls prior to me taking a guided photo tour that I had booked that promised to take you to some spots a little off the beaten path.

We went to Eggberts and had veggie omelet, tomato cheese omelet, GREAT banana pancakes (Jack Johnson knows what he’s singing about). The tour was pretty cool – the guide was a young semi-pro photographer surfer/hiker dude who seemed to know everybody on the island.

The van tour had a mix of people, all the way from someone who had to rent a camera for the tour and get a quick tutorial on its use, to semi-serious amateurs such as guy who had a big ass Canon SLR and used a tripod for everything.

It was a really good way to get a feel for the east and north sides of the island, and it was fun to talk “shop” about photography and pick the guide’s brain about all manner of other island related stuff. I also brought my GPS with me to save location information in case I wanted to return with the girls.

I pitched doing this tour and the girls doing a spa after we couldn’t come to agreement on pre-booking some other tour. The Napali daysails had just resumed from their extended winter hiatus (seas are too rough), and it appears that it is not uncommon for folks to get sick on those multi-hour trips.

Even though WE are not prone to that, it could be pretty unpleasant to be around others that are or who don’t take adequate precautions. My wife was cool to the aerial tours by helicopter or fixed wing for various reasons, so I know better at this point to push back too hard.

So I did locate some spas near the condo that they could do, and my daughter was all for it (massage etc), but my wife balked at the cost and said if I’m going to drop that kind of cash, maybe I rather have some nice piece of jewelry or something to remind me of the island (she does wear a STJ petroglyph necklace a lot, so go argue with that). So, they were on their own to do some shopping, return to the condo beach and pool, etc. and I went off on the photo tour.

Here are some results from that. It would be a little time consuming to cross reference the locations with a map and accurately label everything, so I won’t do that here. If anybody wants to know where anything pictured might specifically be, my SLR does imbed GPS data into the photo so that info is available.

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Some Jurassic Park scenes shot here in these fields…
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Upon my return, I was shocked to learn that my wife had come around to the idea of doing a helicopter tour after she spent some time researching them on line and seeing them fly around the island. Apparently that made her more comfortable with the whole idea.

During their shopping, they noted some vendors and booths selling various tours and luaus for significantly reduced prices posted on whiteboards, but it turns out that involves sitting through a time share spiel. That wasn’t going to happen, so we called her first choice about availability for the 3 of us the next day, and got an afternoon flight at the reduced internet pre-book price.

Conventional wisdom seems to be that morning is better before fog and clouds build up on Napali, but we seemed to be having the opposite weather patterns so we were comfortable with that. I think that I would’ve preferred the fixed wing tour as they don’t fly as close to the cliffs and everybody gets a window seat = much better for photography. My photo tour guide had confirmed this when I asked about it. But I wasn’t going to push it. So we planned out the next day to do Waimea Canyon early and the heli-tour in the afternoon, and that will be the next part of this trip report.

After my photo tour, I was stoked to show them the north shore so we drove up to charming Hanalei for dinner at a pretty cool tapas bar called Bar Acuda.

It was lovely to sit on the side porch and watch the sunset colors play while we enjoyed various small plates such as shrimp Romesco, and inventive versions of bruchetta, mahi, and roasted potatoes, small thin pizza with local goat cheese, all with their own tasty sangria. http://www.restaurantbaracuda.com/ Considering it was “only” tapas, it wasn’t cheap, but it was very good and quite enjoyable.

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Beautiful photos! Thank you for sharing!

enjoying your reports....beautiful pictures....

JMQ, beautiful pictures! Did you like the photo tour? I thought about doing it. I had just gotten my camera and wanted to try it out. I am still not good with my camera. I sorta laughed at your bird picture (day 1).. That birds twin spent a lot of time on our patio and gave me many opportunities to get a good picture. My picture is not nearly as good. I might have to steal yours.

I am glad you did the helicopter tour. It was a highlight for us. I can't wait to see the pictures. We only saw Wilmea Canyon from the helicopter so, I am looking forward to hearing more about it.

Did your wife find any jewelry?

XOXO wrote:JMQ, beautiful pictures! Did you like the photo tour? I thought about doing it. I had just gotten my camera and wanted to try it out. I am still not good with my camera. I sorta laughed at your bird picture (day 1).. That birds twin spent a lot of time on our patio and gave me many opportunities to get a good picture. My picture is not nearly as good. I might have to steal yours.

I am glad you did the helicopter tour. It was a highlight for us. I can't wait to see the pictures. We only saw Wilmea Canyon from the helicopter so, I am looking forward to hearing more about it.

Did your wife find any jewelry?

Nope - any potential jewelry $$$ went towards the heli-tour - not that she saw anything that caught her her anyways.

The Kauai photo tour was pretty cool. They run a nice little operation and deserve their stellar ratings on Tripadvisor.

When you say "not good with your camera", do you mean figuring out various settings and what they can do or actual composition stuff?
The tour guide didnt advocate or coach anything crazy re settings, but was helpful for many on framing tips etc.

The guy with the tripod was talking about what settings (high ISO of 800, selecting higher speeds, etc.) that he used on the helicopter that he used the day before, but I did my own research prior to our heli-tour and was glad I did because those are difficult conditions to shoot under.
Having done it once now, there are some things I couldve done better to reduce reflections even more. But at least I wasnt really struggling with the camera like another girl on the flight who was having her flash go off (!)

One thing I was glad I did use was the continuous shooting mode i.e. multiple rapid fire shots when you hold down the shutter. My SLR is capable of up to 10 frames per second and this was the perfect use for that.

So, yeah, the various auto settings on cameras will give you good results 90% of the time, but for the other times it can be important to be able to know how to change the settings on your camera.

NICE! Especially that shot from behind the tree on Moloa'a Beach. That might be one of my favorite spots in the universe.

jmq wrote: Nope - any potential jewelry $$$ went towards the heli-tour - not that she saw anything that caught her her anyways.

When you say "not good with your camera", do you mean figuring out various settings and what they can do or actual composition stuff?

One thing I was glad I did use was the continuous shooting mode i.e. multiple rapid fire shots when you hold down the shutter. My SLR is capable of up to 10 frames per second and this was the perfect use for that.

So, yeah, the various auto settings on cameras will give you good results 90% of the time, but for the other times it can be important to be able to know how to change the settings on your camera.

I think the helicopter tour is a good choice over jewelry. Especially since she already has a special piece from St. John. Good choice, Mrs. JMQ.

I think I need to spend more time framing. I do have some amazing pictures. But when I look at yours I can see that I am missing a little something. The thing that frustrates me the most is when I FINALLY talk my family into taking a picture I am never happy with the results. My first goal is to improve my "people" picture taking. That includes framing and posing.

I am looking forward to more pictures and your trip reports. St. John and Kauai are both very special places to me and my family. And have they ever spoiled us!! Every where we go we compare it to St. John and/or Kauai and nothing measures up.

I hate handing a camera to somebody to take pictures of us because 8 times out of 10 it pretty much sucks and/or requires a lot of cropping and editing (even guys that have expensive SLRs around their neck).

The best shots I have of us are those I set up myself and used the 10 second timer and run back into the frame LOL (now I REALLY sound like a photo-snob LOL!)

I think you have earned your "photo snobbery". Now, where is part 3????

Another beautiful installemtn! Wonderful pictures. The sunset view of Bali Hai is similar to ours from our villa, we were at the th green of the Makai course in Princeville, directly above the Queen's Bath. Moloa'a Bay was way churned up the day we were there, hard to believe it is the same tranquil place in your photos. We loved Bar Acuda in Hanalei, as well as Kalypso and Tahiti Nui. Can't wait for more!